Head of BC SPCA
Investigations accuses Gwen Wilson of the mental illness of "hoarding"

Power abuse protested

By Paul J. Henderson

Chilliwack Times
published on July 28 2006

A handful of animal
activists held a protest Tuesday in front of the courthouse against what
they see is an SPCA "abuse of power."

At least five people
who have had animals seized by the SPCA, along with supporters, carried
placards and complained that the SPCA uses the courts for fundraising,
they overstep their authority, and they are unaccountable.

"The SPCA step
overboard all the time," said John van Dongen who had horses seized in
2003 and whose brother, Quirinius, recently lost a civil suit against the
SPCA for wrongful seizure. "It's all about the donations."

Also attending the
protest were the father and son Jan and Craig Huisman who have been
charged with a number of counts of causing an animal to continue to be in
distress and will go to trial in February of next year. The SPCA seized 40
emaciated calves and six goats from the Huismans in 2004 after monitoring
the animals and making recommendations that were never followed.

The Huismans blame
their neighbours for complaining to the SPCA because "they think every
time an animal makes a peep it needs to be cared for."

A much more recent
case is that of Tamara Baker who has not yet been charged, but whose
40-plus dogs were seized a week ago.

"They weren't in
distress," Baker told the Times at the protest. "I run a licensed kennel,
the complaint was from my ex-boyfriend. He did it out of spite."

The SPCA frequently
get complaints from jilted friends or neighbours, but they never pursue
complaints that are not founded, according to Marcie Moriarty, the general
manager for cruelty investigations.

"Seizing an animal is
the very last resort," Moriarty told the Times. "There is no benefit to us
to seize animals. The fact of the matter is the vet bills are astronomical
because the animals are found in such a bad condition."

Another animal owner
at the protest was Gwen Wilson who became known as the cat lady of Hope
because she had so many cats.

Wilson said she did
the best she could to care for her cats, but because of her personal
health problems it wasn't always easy. Because she became known for her
cats she would frequently have animals left on her doorstep to the point
where it was too many.

"I asked them [the
SPCA] to help me," she said. "They wouldn't help me. Nobody would help
me."

Moriarty said Wilson's
case was "extremely sad" and the SPCA only seize animals that are deemed
to be in distress purusant to the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals act.
"She had 70 cats locked in a trailer," Moriarty said. "Every single
horizontal surface was covered in feces. The stink was so bad the vet
would not go in."

Wilson-who Moriarty
says suffers from a recognized clinical condition known as animal
hoarding-currently faces two counts of cruelty and her case has been
remanded until Aug. 29.

The list of complaints
against the SPCA by those at the protest include: using the courts and
animal seizures as fundraising schemes, being unaccountable to anyone, and
not having a good definition of abuse to base their seizures upon.

"They are just a bunch
of thieves," said Quirius van Dongen who filed a lawsuit seeking more than
$32,000 in damages against the SPCA claiming his animals were unlawfully
seized.

In his ruling on July
20 against van Dongen, Judge D.R. Gardner noted, among other things, that,
"I agree with the defence submission that in addition to recovering
damages that he believes are due to him, these proceedings are also about
gaining some form of vengeance against the SPCA. In the claimant's words:
'They need to be taught a lot of lessons.'"

To counter the various
criticisms brought up at the courthouse protest, Moriarty pointed out that
the SPCA rely almost solely on donations to do their work, and that
seizing animals couldn't possibly result in fundraising success because of
the vet bills with which they usually get stuck.

As far as the
accountability goes, the SPCA special constables are appointed under the
Police Act, and the society falls under the purview of the Ministry of
Agriculture and Lands.

As far as the
definition of abuse goes, Moriarty says the three-part definition in the
prevention of cruelty to animals act is actually quite clear. In the act,
an "animal in distress" is one that is either (a) deprived of adequate
food, water or shelter, (b) injured, sick, in pain or suffering, or (c)
abused or neglected.

The reality, according
to Moriarty, is that "all of these individuals for various reasons and to
various extents had neglected their animals

Gwen's "neglected" dogs not only had a river to swim in,
but their own pools to play in.

Gwen is greeted by her remaining pets on returning home
from the rally. The dogs, the goats, and Spampig the rescued
Pot-bellied pig.

AAS has seen hoarders and
Gwen is not a hoarder

Gwen did not ever actively solicit
cats, she did not go out trapping feral cats, she did not
advertise herself as a cat rescuer, she would have rehomed them but
there are many more cats than there are homes for them, and though
she asked for help in rehoming them, she got none. Hoarders will not
give up their animals.

Every sick cat was being treated
medically, even though it cost Gwen a lot of money. She
believed that they did not deserve to be killed. That is more than
can be said for the SPCA which has warehoused cats in dirty little
cages for months at a time and then kills them when they inevitably
get sick.

To be called a hoarder
is cruel when it is not true. Gwen is being treated for cancer, cannot work until
she is better, and can't afford a lawyer to stop the SPCA's powerful
campaign against her.

Everyone went on a walk
to the river every day

Gwen told us how she
would take the dogs to the river (which you can just make out beyond
the trees) every day, sometimes twice a day; and how the goats and
the ducks and the geese and about twenty of the cats would all come
with them.

The SPCA killed those
cats or (less likely) sold them.

It killed
Afleck, the Canada goose with the
smashed wing that couldn't fly anymore and was brought to Gwen two
years ago by someone who found him dying. The SPCA told Gwen that
she didn't have a permit to have a Canada goose and that they had
killed him. He was a happy member of Gwen's family until the SPCA
got him.

The ducks come to the gate
with the dogs to greet us

Every animal we met on
our visit with Gwen was calm, happy, friendly and healthy.

All the animals had
total freedom. The cats had freedom, fields to stalk mice in, trees
to climb, and a welcoming lap when they wanted a cuddle. The
door of the cat's trailer, where they were fed, was only shut at
night to keep them safe from coyotes. But they weren't safe
from the SPCA. Gwen's treatment of her animals met the SPCA's
own Five Freedoms - more than can be said for animals at SPCAs.

The BC SPCA's Five Freedoms

We pledge our energies to inspire and
mobilize society to create a world in which all animals, who depend
on humans for their well-being, experience, as a minimum, five
essential freedoms: